As we mentioned in this previous blog, winter and spring of junior year is the optimal time to visit colleges. And, you can click on the “tours and visits” blog category on our blog’s main page for more advice about how to make the most of your visits and why they are important.

During your first winter meeting with your Campus Bound counselor, you will get a list of colleges that fit what you are seeking. But once you get that list, and if you are looking at colleges farther away, how do you go about planning these trips? Campus Bound will attempt to be a travel agent in this helpful blog.

Part of the college process in the winter/ spring of junior year is deciding what kinds of students you want to surround yourself with in college. Which types of students inspire you and enable you to do your best? Different schools attract different students, which influences the culture on campus.

In these early winter months, seniors are wrapping up the college application process, and juniors are typically starting. There are two weeks that all juniors should already have marked on their calendars. If you don’t… do it now!

It truly seems unfair that many colleges have January 1 application deadlines. In fact, many schools have pushed these deadlines to January 5 or January 15 in order to give students a break from having applications due on New Years Day. But even so, for students with deadlines in December, January, or even February, the holidays can be a challenging time of juggling family obligations, schoolwork, and college applications. The good news is that there are things you can do to make this time a little bit easier and less stressful.

If you haven’t already read this article from Education Week, I suggest that you do so. It was concerning to us here at Campus Bound, and we wanted to take this opportunity, in this blog, to respond to it.

The take-away from the article, and from this recent study from the National Association of College Admission Counselors, is that only a third of the public high schools in the United States have a college counselor, or designated counselor, to help them with post-high school educational goals. Even more concerning is that the likeliness of a school having a college counselor goes down as the poverty rate of the high school students goes up. So even fewer middle to lower class students are getting this kind of support.

It’s counter-intuitive, but parents who take a step back from their child’s college admissions process may actually hear more. It can be very hard advice to follow; we get it, but stick with us on this.

When I’ve asked groups of juniors and seniors what their parents can do to help them with the college process, their response is almost always… stop asking me about the college process. A student once told me, “I just want to have one dinner with my family where college isn’t brought up.”

Much of the staff at Campus Bound has worked here for several years. It’s a fabulous place to work for many reasons, including: the collegiality among the staff, the guidance of the senior staff and supervisors, and, most importantly, the clients we serve. One of the great things about working at Campus Bound is the honor of being able to work with a family over several years. It’s one of the true joys of my job.

From time to time, we like to utilize the well over 50 years of combined college admissions experience of the Campus Bound staff to provide students and parents with some inside scoop. These counselors have been on the other side of the desk, so their advice is priceless.

This time, we asked our former College Admission Counselors, “If a student has less than stellar grades, how can they enhance their application in other ways?”

Unfortunately, this happens quite a bit: we’ll have our first meeting with student and then they say the words we dislike hearing, “I wish I had known that…”

We wish the college process wasn’t confusing or difficult, but the truth is, it can be. Here are some of the most common scenarios, by school year, in which we hear students say “I wish I knew that!” Pay attention… don’t let it be you!